Bubbleworld

Another attempt to keep the "Shorties" from drowning us all. I'm sitting in the spare room in my folks house, well really in my sister's old room; my dad is in what used to be my old room, there's nobody in what used to be my parents room. I'm pounding through my RSS feeds that have piled up through the day while I was at the hospital.

The whole experience is a sort of bubble world. Days go by so quickly it is astounding, but the hours poke by endlessly. More quickly than you could think possible you lose track what day of the week it is. My dad keeps asking what day it is, and for a while we were sure it was because he was totally wigged out on pain-killers, but really that's not fair because maybe half the time if you asked me I couldn't tell you what day it was and I haven't taken anything - maybe I should.

Hospice at the hospital is surreal. Mom has a nearly endless parade of supportive friends. Today there must have been 10 different people not counting my wife and I, my sister, my dad and the caregiver we've forced on him. Her friends have been great. I wonder if I would put forth nearly the effort they have were I in a similar situation. We sit and talk and watch mom's face. She doesn't speak much at all anymore, so we listen to her breathe, or more accurately listen when she isn't breathing, and we watch for her to wince or grimace or show any other indication of pain. When we do see something we tell the nurse and they give mom a morphine push. Sometimes hours go by with nothing. One stretch today she got three pushes and a drip increase plus a sedative in 60 minutes. It's swell.

Around that I try to get my dad to go to the doctor, to the physical therapist, to a counselor, try to make sure he's eating, fix his television, check out his bills, and generally try to get him in a headspace where he'll be prepared for the death of his wife of more than 40 years. Even without mom's cancer he has his own suite of problems and under these conditions it's impossible to tell what is physical, what is cognitive, and what is emotional. As much as what's going on at the hospital is depressing, watching what is going on at home and trying to figure out what will go on at home after is staggering.

So we set up for tomorrow: fix the overbilling at the rehab, nail down the arrangements between the hospital and the two funeral homes (it's a multistate tour - would you expect less for my mom?), come up with an obit, take down a cristmas tree, maybe, maybe try to do the spring stagecraft call calendar, and spend some time at the hospital.

Unless the train goes over the top of the hill, have to wait and see.